I smoke, I am trying to quit, but at this time I smoke. I won’t like, I enjoy it, it’s my mental break from work, my social time with the few friends that do smoke and my alone time, time for me to decompress. But I know I need to quit for my health, and I am trying.
Having said that, I also believe in personal freedom and responsibility, something that seems to be a dwelling idea. It seems that every day or so someone is trying to micromanage our lives.
Be it, the so called sugar tax, or limiting our access to table salt or smoking. Laws have been enacted to control our personal choice in what we decide to eat, drink or smoke. As of today, smoking is legal, pop (soda for you non mid-western people) or eat. Someone in a seat of power decides they don’t like salt, so BAM! Table salt is not removed from the tables. Pop is high in sugar, and we must not be smart enough to control out intake, so some smart political elite decides to place a high tax on it. The political class has decided that restaurants and bars cannot decide if they want to be a smoking or smoke free establishment, only the over reaching hand of the government can decide such things.
Once again, I am a smoker, and for the most part, I have no issue with smoke free restaurants and bars, but, and this is a big but, the rights of the establishment owners has been taken away, they and they alone should be able to decide what type of clientele they want. If the local bar wants to be a “smokers” bar, they should be able to do so, giving the costumers the choice on where they would like to spend there hard earned money. The government should not be able to decide this. Yes, the government can regulate the ability to smoke in public, and I have no issue with this. I have no issue that we can not smoke in hospitals, post-offices and other public places, but a private business should be able to decide if they wish to serve smokers.
What truly boggles my mine is this.. As we, as a nation are becoming more and more smoke free (a good thing) we are also, as a nation, pushing more and more to legalize smoking pot… Not really sure I understand that. Having said that, do I think pot should be legal, sure, why not, I do not smoke it, i do not like it and I do not really understand it. But I can have a beer or 5, alter my mind, why can’t a person of legal age enjoy a joint? But that is a different topic, so enough said.
So what brings this whole topic of smoking up? This:
Senate Bill 23, which Brown sponsored, would repeal a portion of the state code that prohibits employers from attempting to control their workers’ tobacco intake outside of the job. The section she hopes to repeal reads:
An employer may not require, as a condition of employment, an employee or prospective employee refrain from using or discriminate against an employee with respect to the employee’s compensation and benefits or terms and conditions of employment based on the employee’s use of tobacco products.
So ask yourself, whats next? In five years from now, will a company be able to fire you, or not hire you based on the fact they decided eating meat is bad for you? Laugh if you like, but ten years ago did we ever think Salt would be removed form tables or Pop be taxed at a higher rate or testing for tobacco be even something we would consider.
It is always a slippery slop when we allow government the power to dictate personal choice and responsibility (think ObamaCare).
The Nanny State is here, and the longer we allow it to stay, the harder it will be to get the government out of our personal life. The more we allow the government the ability to think for us (the stupid masses) the harder it will be for us to take back our basic human right to think for ourselves.
So before all you anti-smokers hail this as a great move, to protect us smokers from our own stupidity, remember, today its smoking, tomorrow it maybe bacon… Personal liberty, personal responsibility and personal freedom, is just that, personal, left up to the individual. The government should not be involved in my personal life on such a level.
How far off are we from a national smokers registration list, or our drivers licence’s being branded with a notation that I am a smoker, like the scarlet letter painted across my chest for all to see that I am a low life second class citizen.
Laugh if you want…
Use the internet, do your research, and look at all the little liberties that have been removed in our recent history… Look at how the nanny state has grown, and ask yourself, what will prevent them from regulating ____________? (fill in the blank with your vice of choice, TV, Internet, Foods, Drinks…).
The answer…. NOTHING!
Once the government is given an inch, they take two thousand miles…
Man, this posting has stressed me out.. I think I will go outside, thank goodness its a nice day today in Michigan and the deep freeze has left us, for now, and have a smoke!)
God Bless
Paul Sposite, a low life smoker.
An American Point of View 